3D printing is already a familiar technology.

Whether it is building houses, making clothes, designing creative dishes, or applying it in other fields, 3D printing products are gradually entering and changing our lives.

But have you ever imagined using 3D printed guns?

In June this year, the US government unexpectedly decided to allow the gun-rights organization "Distributed Defense" to publish the drawings of 3D printed guns online from August 1.

This decision immediately caused huge controversy, and people are asking, has the era of DIY lethal weapons arrived?

This is a 3D printed gun, based on the AR-15 rifle.

This gun has appeared in many shootings in the United States.

According to the latest decision of the US government, from August 1 this year, everyone can download the drawings from a website called "Distributed Defense" and print out such a gun.

Cody Wilson, the founder of the gun-rights organization "Distributed Defense", is also the initiator of 3D printed guns. He calls himself an anarchist and believes that everyone should have the right to obtain guns.

On December 14, 2012, a shooting occurred at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, killing 28 people, including the gunman, 20 of whom were children. The case shocked the whole country.

After the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, then-President Obama issued 23 executive measures to strengthen gun control: including strengthening background checks on gun buyers, prohibiting the sale of offensive guns and high-capacity magazines.

These measures were strongly resisted by the "gun advocates", who launched a series of demonstrations.

Cody Wilson also publicly opposed Obama's gun control measures and threatened to use 3D printing technology to end the controversy over gun control.

On May 5, 2013, Wilson showed the world the first pistol "Liberator" he made with a 3D printer, and posted the pistol production drawings and files online.

Getting the "Liberator" is simple. No background check, proof of age or gun license is required. All you need to do is download a computer-aided design drawing file of the pistol, a 3D printer, and a thermoplastic ABS plastic used to make Lego bricks. Then you can make the pistol yourself by patiently waiting for 12 hours or a day.

Forbes magazine reported that after Wilson uploaded the "Liberator" pistol production drawings, the number of downloads exceeded 100,000 in just two days, but most of the downloaders were not from the United States, but from abroad.

The "Liberator" made Wilson famous overnight and attracted much media attention.

Two British Daily Mail reporters spent 1,700 pounds to buy a 3D printer and printed out 16 pistol parts. Because the pistol was made of synthetic materials, the X-ray machine could not detect the pistol. The reporters successfully passed the security check at the London train station and took the parts on the train.

Afterwards, they assembled the pistol in the toilet of the carriage and took photos with the gun in the aisle of the carriage. During the whole process, no one came to stop them.

Several Australian policemen heard about Wilson's invention and decided to try to make it themselves to see how powerful the 3D printed pistol was.

It took them only 27 hours to complete the production of all the parts of the pistol, and 1 minute to complete the assembly and start testing.

When the police pulled the traction rope tied to the trigger of the pistol, the disturbing result occurred.

The fired bullet made a hole in the thick gelatin, but due to the huge recoil, the pistol instantly cracked at the same time as the shot.

The results of multiple tests showed that owning such a 3D printed pistol is difficult to track, may injure others, and may also threaten oneself.

For this reason, some American politicians and anti-gun groups have called for the passage of new regulations to criminalize the private printing of firearms and weapons. People are more worried that terrorists may use this technology to secretly manufacture weapons.

On May 8, 2013, Wilson received a letter from the U.S. State Department's Defense Trade Controls Bureau, accusing him of posting gun printing drawings on a website so that people outside the United States could download them, violating the relevant regulations on arms exports in the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, and ordering him to immediately delete the gun-making drawings on the website.

Wilson removed the drawings as ordered, but he claimed that he did not break the law because it is legal for citizens to make guns for personal use in the United States.

Two years later, in 2015, the "Distributed Defense" he founded filed a lawsuit against the U.S. federal government.

After three years of judicial battles, the two sides reached a settlement in June this year.

The Trump administration allowed the organization to publish 3D printing gun drawings online from August 1.

But the organization put the drawings online five days in advance, on July 27, and more than 1,000 people downloaded the drawings within three days.

On July 30, eight states and the District of Columbia sued the federal government, demanding a China-wide temporary ban to prevent 3D printed gun blueprints from appearing on the Internet.

On July 31, Robert Lasnik, a federal judge in Seattle, Washington, approved a motion to issue a China-wide temporary ban to stop the online sharing of 3D printed gun blueprints, and announced a hearing on the case on August 10.

On the same day, Trump also made an ambiguous statement on the matter: I am investigating 3D plastic guns sold to the public. I have talked to the Chinese Rifle Association of the United States about this matter, but it doesn't seem to make much sense!

Due to historical reasons, Americans' disputes over gun ownership often revolve around the issue of personal rights.

However, the emergence and legalization of 3D printed guns have brought about even more thinking than the controversy over the legalization of guns.

Because the changes in technology have in fact challenged the state's control over weapons, this decentralized manufacturing and production may pose an unprecedented challenge to government authority and social order.

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